Colacurcio Jr. pleads guilty to hiding campaign donations

By HECTOR CASTRO, P-I REPORTER

Published 10:00 pm, Thursday, January 24, 2008

A guilty plea Thursday by strip-club owner Frank Colacurcio Jr. to charges that he tried to influence the 2003 Seattle City Council election by hiding contributions he made through straw donors was a victory for campaign ethics, King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg said.

Noting that four years of work went into the case, Satterberg said the result established the principle "that hiding the true source of campaign contributions is a felony."

Frank Colacurcio Sr., who was scheduled to plead guilty at the same hearing, was a no-show. His attorney said the 90-year-old man was too ill, and so his hearing was rescheduled to 1:30 p.m. Monday.

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The elder Colacurcio is expected to receive the same $10,000 fine as his son. His son didn't receive jail time and neither will he.

Seattle campaign finance laws limit to $650 the amount a single donor can make to a candidate, but the Colacurcios wanted to funnel more money to candidates they believed would favor their effort to win a zoning change to expand the parking lot at their strip club on Lake City Way.

So, the two men have admitted, they had relatives, friends or associates make donations to the campaigns of Heidi Wills, Judy Nicastro and Jim Compton, then reimbursed those donors in an effort to hide their tracks.

The investigation did not show how the Colacurcios expected to wield influence over the candidates. Wills, Nicastro and Compton are no longer on the City Council.

But the investigation never turned up any evidence that these council members knew the money was coming from the Colacurcios, though investigators believe that the three campaigns received as much as $39,000.

Still, after previously twice denying the rezoning, the City Council approved it, allowing for the larger parking lot. The vote was 5-4, with all three beneficiaries voting in favor of the expansion.

It was just weeks ago that prosecutors and attorneys for the accused sat down to work out a plea. Because the false-reporting law violations to which he pleaded guilty are a Class C felony, Colacurcio Jr., 46, also loses the right to vote and possess firearms.

He also agreed to 12 months of unsupervised probation.

Gil Conte, 74, an associate of the Colacurcios, entered an Alford plea to conspiracy charges, not admitting guilt, but agreeing a jury would likely find him guilty.

Marsha Furfaro, 67, the manager of the Colacurcios' Talents West booking agency for club dancers, had been charged with funneling donations to the candidates through her daughters and their husbands, but the charges against her were dismissed.